GUERILLA REDEMPTION & SURVIVAL

Tour Update Stage 10 – July 12

Awesome to see Vacansoleil work together today – they sent Marco Marcato up the road to collect as many mountain points as possible and then had two to three guys around Johnny Hoogerland all day long.  They should have given him the “Combative” prize again today instead of his teammate Marcato. Hopefully he can heal up enough to go out on a flyer on Thursday chasing some big mountain points on the Tourmalet.

What a great finish to the stage.  Seeing the yellow jersey and green jersey on attack with 10k to go makes for great racing.  It’s encouraging to see the riders willing to take an attack risk rather then wait for the inevitable sprint when a big team like HTC takes the front.  Perfect tactics by Omega-Parma, even with only 6 riders they were able to go to the front and split the field on a category 4 climb to launch Gilbert’s attack – and then at the finish they still had one guy to lead out Andre Greipel – the man the call The Guerilla.

Crazy last 20k today - HTC blew all their guys just getting back over the last Cat 4 hill and controlling the too race early – Cav was solo with 1km to go – he did the only thing he could which was open the sprint first – but Greipel came past him with a HUGE burst of speed.  To be honest I didn’t think Greipel could make it over all the hills today but what an impressive win and what a great set up by Omega-Pharma.  Even though they lost their GC guy they are having a GREAT tour.  This may cause the Omega company to consider staying with Marc Sergeant’s team next year after all.

Notes:

• Not be out-Euroed of course Colnago had an even more yellow bike made for Tommy V for today’s stage.  The yellow tinted bike was only a training bike for yesterday.
• I wonder how sick Goss is – he dropped off with about 60k to go today .
• Cav couldn’t help rip on Greipel immediately after getting beat by him. I’m not sure if his arrogance is refreshing in the sport or a sign of his immaturity. I think he’s so emotional he just says what come to mind without thinking first… why not!
• http://twitter.com/#!/MarkCavendish/status/82110755171860481
• Great finish again by Gilbert and Thor – everyday they keep increasing their value on the transfer market.

 
Transfer Rumors

I was a bit surprised that there weren’t more announcements about sponsorship and rider signings yesterday during the rest day.  I know the UCI rules say teams and athletes cannot talk about next year’s signings until August 1^st – unless they are re-signing to their current team.  There is also a new regulation this year which allows athletes to actually switch teams mid-season from August 1^st to August 15^th.  That’s an interesting option for riders a team doesn’t want anymore and who already have a deal in place for next year.  A guy like Pieter Weening – he’s fallen out of favor at Rabobank and has already announced he’s leaving at the end of the year.  If another team can take over his salary from August to December they might go for it.

Big announcements that will take place soon include the biggest sprint names on the transfer market: Philippe Gilbert, Thor Hushovd, Mark Cavendish & Matt Goss.  Goss is already linked to the new Australian team Greenedge, and BMC has been reported to have offer Gilbert “whatever it takes”.  After this Tour Thor probably has offers from every French team and most other teams in the peloton as well.  He’s in the drivers seat for sure now.  Reports yesterday have an offer from BMC for he and Gilbert to be a one-two spring classic punch.  Cav has been linked to Sky for the past three years – so it would take a colossal misstep by David Brailsford to lose him this time around.  Part of it will certainly depend on the commitment Sky can make to build a lead out train around him – but also it depends on HTC finalizing a new sponsor by next Monday. Rumors say it's looking good.

If HTC in fact doesn’t have new sponsor lined up expect BMC to make a huge play for Tejay van Garderen – he’s a young American with an already building fan base, he has great stage race indications and he’s young enough that they don’t need results right away from him.  With Andrew Talansky on Garmin getting better too there will be a great rivalry between them for years to come.

Tomorrow – Blaye-les-Mines to Lavaur – 167.5km

Another short, but not flat stage that will test the sprinter near the end to see if they can keep up.  Some good climbing near the beginning and then a Cat 4 climb 32km from the end.  Shouldn’t be enough to drop off the real sprinters – so expect to see the dueling lead out trains of HTC vs. Garmin again tomorrow.  HTC wore themselves out today again (like stage 3) and so expect them to look for help tomorrow from Europcar, Omega Pharma and Garmin over the last 80km.  Should be another medium sized break to start and Europcar will again keep the gap to less then 5 minutes for most of the day.

Look for Vacansoleil to put someone into the early break to get the Cat 3 points and then a bunch of French guys to rotate through until about 20k to go.

Cavendish will want to win BAD tomorrow – after getting beat by his biggest rival today he’s going to have his team all fired up.  With a slight downhill to flat finish there should be no way he won’t have the leadout he needs. Expect him to come off Renshaw’s wheel at 70kph and just beat Farrar to the line.

Winner: Mark Cavendish

Yellow: Thomas Voeckler

Green: Phillipe Gilbert

Polka dot: Johnny Hoogerland